


Facies Renidens

by NorroenDyrd



Series: Amabilis Insania [7]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Father-Son Relationship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Helpful Cole (Dragon Age), Hurt/Comfort, In the Fade, Parent-Child Relationship, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Teenage Drama, The Fade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-20 14:48:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8252999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorroenDyrd/pseuds/NorroenDyrd
Summary: The title translates from Latin (stand-in for Tevene in this case) as 'Smiling Face'. This is the image that is used, at different times and under different circumstances, by people who want to cheer up someone that they care about. First, it comes to the aid of a frightened young boy who feels broken an inadequate, having almost no magical talent in a society where he is expected to excel in magic. And then, many years later, after the boy grows into a man and is claimed by premature death, this very same image is invoked by the Inquisitor, to comfort the boy's father, her onetime enemy turned friend.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I have positioned this story within the series in the slot where it belongs chronologically, as Yavanna visits Alexius in the Fade shortly after Felix dies - but the last paragraph also references a story titled Quattuor Verbi, Tres Verbi, which occurs much later in the same series.

Of course, on the way back home from that fancy dinner, Father would not stop talking about how it was all his fault, and about how sorry he was, and about how he should never have brought along 'his boy, who has more worth in his little finger than all that foulmouthed lot put together'. That is only natural - the blaming, that is; not the 'more worth part'. Father always holds himself responsible for everything even remotely bad that ever happens (earning him rolled-up eyes and an exasperated sigh from Mother). But in this case, Father really shouldn't feel so upset. In the end, that disastrous outing served a good purpose... Sort of.  
  
If Felix hadn't bugged him so much, if he hadn't whined about his loneliness and this burning, tear-wringing wish he had, to meet and talk and play with other children his age; if he had kept quiet - he never would have gotten to meet these children - and they never would have made him see the truth.  
  
He can still hear their voices, throbbing in a dull echo somewhere in the pit of his stomach, where most of the pain is now coiled up, like one of those snakes everyone absolutely has to draw and sculpt wherever there's some free space (and this particular snake has certainly taken up all the free space that is left among his innards). He can still picture their faces - those pretty, proud faces of the proper Altus children. Good children. Normal children. Children who will soon grow up, and become Magisters like their parents, and continue their... what was it... lineage for centuries and centuries more. Because they have magic - and unlike him, they can actually use it for casting complex, impressive spells; they actually have it in them to finish a course at the Circle, where they are praised and applauded and called their country's future. And maybe some of them are even in Father's class - maybe he has to look at them every day, with that deep frown of his, as they do all the wonderful things with their magic that he will never, ever see from Felix.  
  
Those pretty faces grew twisted with disdain, when the good little mages heard who Felix was; they started talking to him slowly, in short, deliberately simple words, as though he was not quite all right in the head - and then, they took to taunting him, firing at him with spells that he could have easily disrupted with a barrier if he was... normal... And shouting - shouting all those things, singing a derisive chant that he keeps hearing, as the invisible snake slighters and hisses inside his stomach.  
  
A freak, they called him. A runt. A mishap. Worse than a Soporati. And they were right.  
  
It was not their fault that Felix and his parents had to leave early: Mother flushed and frowning every time she heard the youngsters snicker behind her back (that was their response to her trying to get them to behave); and Father, stiff and silent, his hand firmly gripping Felix's shoulder. It was not the fault of the normal children - it was his fault, Felix's, and his alone. All that the others did was open his eyes.  
  
A couple of years ago, there was this birthday party, which ended in chaos and screeching before it could even properly start; and there was that tempting sugary cake, so sweet and dainty, and laced with poison.  And there was some of that pain, like what he is feeling now; he cringes when remembering how he bawled when he found out that his grandfather wanted him dead. Back then, his parents reassured him that Grandfather was wrong - and being young and stupid, he even believed them for a while. But now he knows better - he knows that they were just being nice to him; now, he is not a gullible baby any more; now, he understands the full... what was the word... implications.  
  
His family, like any other family, was supposed to try its best to create a perfect mage, a perfect Magister, by refining their bloodline from generation to generation, like some sort of solvent in a long and difficult alchemy experiment. And he has ruined it all - simply by being born. Simply by being the way he is. He has turned out to be a horrible, crushing disappointment, without even doing anything - his very existence is a blow that their house will never recover from. The Alexius line is doomed to meet a miserable, shameful end, the worst nightmare of any Tevinter Altus clan - all because of him. His father, who he loves so much, who he wants to be happy more than anything in the world, will never have a real heir. A proper heir. An heir he could be proud of.  
  
As the coils of the unseen snake grow tighter than ever before, Felix gasps frantically for breath, his chest and throat trapped in the sticky clutches if nausea. He has almost stopped registering the knife in his hand - a thin, glinting sliver of a blade, dancing over the scratched blur that he thinks is supposed to be his arm, the sleeve of his robe rolled back to expose his skin.  
  
It is a small, almost toy-like knife, for cutting envelopes and the pages of new books. Picking it up was the first thing he did after stumbling into his room, and sending away the family slave with a request to tell his parents he wasn't hungry, and wouldn't be joining them for supper.  
  
At first, he was guided by a crazy impulse to... maybe... sort of... do some blood magic? It is supposed to make people more powerful, after all; what if he managed to finally cast one of those tricky spells, with his blood acting as a source of mystic energy or... whatever? His parents do not approve of this kind of spellcraft - but he has heard lots of rumours of other families relying on it. Maybe if he became a blood mage, he could qualify as a Magister? Maybe he could turn normal?  
  
But, him being the pathetic failure that he is, all the poking with the knife has achieved nothing - except make the snake within him swell in size, till he feels like it might burst out of his belly at any moment. Angry with himself, he applies more pressure to the knife - and as the blade slashes at his skin, it also seems to slash  at the stifling darkness that has been brewing in his body, as he recollected the way the normal children treated him, and the way his grandfather tried to set things right. Like a snatch of cloth, darkness get violently ripped apart by a blinding white flash of pain. Felix can no longer feel the presence of the snake - oddly enough, the sting of the blade has brought him a release from the grasp of its heavy, slimy coils. At the same time, while he watches his own blood adorn his forearm with tiny ruby balls, which roll down and draw perfect, ribbon-like lines when he moves his arm - he tells himself, his lips warping into a gloating grimace, that this is a proper punishment for someone like him. He deserves the pulsing pain underneath his skin, and the wet, hot tracks of blood. He deserves it all - and much more.  
  
'Felix - Mother sent me up to... Felix? Heavens boy, what are you doing?!'  
  
Clank, clank. The knife falls to the floor, slipping out of his hand as he hurries to readjust his sleeve. But it is already too late: Father has seen him. Stupid, stupid - he should have locked the door, not just closed it!  
  
A scorching feeling building up in his eyes and his nose, Felix cannot bring himself to say a single word in reply, fearing that if he does, he will start bawling again, like the stupid baby he used to be. Hanging his head and looking away, he remains where he has been all this time, sitting on the floor with a bloodied knife at his side - while the large, warm, familiar hands gently brush against his limp, obedient arm, and pull back the cloth of his sleeve. Moments later, the sparks of a healing spell tickles his skin, like his hand has been gloved in stardust. He slants his eyes, and his sidelong glance, from underneath  knitted eyebrows, meets the worried gaze of his father.  
  
'You are in so much pain, my boy...' the grown man whispers, looking like he himself is on the verge of tears; somehow, Felix can feel that he is not talking about just the cuts. 'I am so sorry... But I am here now, and I swear will do my best to take all the pain away!'  
  
'Why?' Felix asks hoarsely. 'I deserve it!'  
  
'That is not true and I will prove it to you,' Father says firmly. 'But for now...'  
  
He raises Felix's hand to his eyes, to show that the markings of the knife are gone.  
  
'If you feel your pain bursting out again, why don't you take up a quill instead of a blade?'  
  
'What do you mean?' Felix mouths, confused.  
  
'Rather than cutting, draw something on your skin instead,' Father explains, pulling the boy to his feet and gently steering him towards his writing desk.  
  
Picking up a quill, he dips it into the inkwell, and presses it into the hand of his son, who smiles, quite in spite of himself.  
  
'That would be stupid!' he says, glancing down at his forearm.  
  
'I would rather have my son look stupid than get drenched in his own blood,' Father returns his smile. 'Because I love him'.  
  
'Even... Even despite all that's wrong with him?' Felix asks cautiously.  
  
'There is nothing wrong with you, Felix. You have your own talents, your own soul - and that is what makes you... you. And I would not have it any other way. These spiteful magelings that tormented you - they are forced to fill the moulds their parents shaped for them; they are not allowed to be their own person - their destiny is to serve as a mirror for their parents' pride... No, not pride: hubris'.  
  
'Hubris?' the boy echoes the unfamiliar word. 'That sounds like something... From under there'.  
  
With that, he gestures below his robe's belt.  
  
'Perhaps you are right,' the grown man replies, unable to hold back a shameless, boyish laugh.  
  
Felix joins him, his voice still a little weak - but that is more than enough for his father, who beams at him and draws him into a one-armed hug.  
  
'I love you, son,' he repeats. 'And I always will'.  
  
The tips of his ears flushing, Felix grips at the quill a little bit tighter, and then, with an impulsive gesture, draws a lopsided circle on his wrist, adding two dots and a bold curve to form a comically smiling face.  
  
***  
  
'Impressive. Most impressive'.  
  
Solas nods in approval, as the young Inquisitor, who is standing next to him on a snow-capped rock overlooking a sleepy little hamlet, lifts her arms and, with a lot of intense finger waggling, manages to change the colour of the floating snowflakes from blueish white to pink, which gradually makes the timber houses look like edible gingerbread figurines with strawberry glazing.  
  
'Thank you, hahren!' she chirps in reply. 'This is incredible... I am almost like a mage!'  
  
'Not just a mage,' the older elf corrects her with a small smile. 'The ability to share other people's dreams and transform the Fade is very rare; your Mark has truly granted you remarkable skills'.  
  
'Oooh, like a Somniari then, right?' the Inquisitor asks enthusiastically. 'Dorian told me about them: they sometimes work as assassins to kill people in their sleep - and I don't mean like creep up on them and...'  
  
'Yes, I am aware of the practice,' Solas cuts in, curling his lips in disapproval (which became evident the moment his companion mentioned the name 'Dorian'). 'I have seen... memories of such assassinations in the Fade. I can only hope that you will use your newly honed gift for good purposes'.  
  
'Oh, most definitely!' the Inquisitor nods her head several times, each faster than the next. 'Actually, I have a few ideas already... Do you suppose I could enter the dreams of a particular person like this?'  
  
'With enough concentration, I don't see why not,' Solas muses. 'Unless they are a dwarf, of course...'  
  
'Oh no, he is not a dwarf!' the young elf grins.  
  
'He?' Solas repeats, eyebrow raised. 'So you know whose dreams you wish to explore?'  
  
'Yeah...' she confirms, her face growing more serious. 'I want to comfort him, see, but he is not much for talking these days... I am just afraid that it will be... kind of an intrusion'.  
  
'People say I intrude all the time,' a third voice joins them, slow and rhythmic, with no definite body attached to it, save for a hazy silhouette in a huge round hat.  
  
'They say I am bothersome, even though I try not to be... Small, quiet as a mouse... All I want to do is help! And you want to help too! Smashed crystal in the grass, like a handful of cold, hard tears; the last time he will ever hear his son's voice. He looks so helpless, so scared - like in that raw, red, ruptured world; only this time, there is no going back...'  
  
'Ah, Cole - so gracious of you to join us,' Solas greets the pale, lanky, ghost-like boy, who steps slowly toward them, his face and body melting into a more solid form.  
  
Then, the elf's expression shifts again; his eyes grow sharp as steel as he turns to address the Inquisitor,  
  
'Surely, you would not seek the companionship of that Venatori who wished to capture the rebel mages? Who planned to erase you from the very fabric of time? I have seen you talk to him during our journey to Skyhold - and I am thankful it did not occur to him to try and appease his master one more time.'  
  
'Please don't talk about him like he is just a villain! There is more to him than that,' the Inquisitor objects. 'He did what he thought was the right thing - he tried to save the people he cared about. It just got... sort of twisted along the way'.  
  
'And you... Instead of animosity, you offer him your compassion...'  
  
No longer having a hard, metallic glint, Solas' eyes grow strangely widened for a fleeting moment - thoughtful, almost mesmerized, as a certain realization seems to sink in.  
  
'Pretty much,' the young elf agrees, evidently very pleased to see that 'hahren' understands. 'His son... passed away just recently, and he is suffering terribly. I hate to see him go through this alone... But he has closed himself off, and I am running out of ways to let him know that his friend is there for him'.  
  
'I can help you with the helping!' Cole suggests readily, as he extends his rag-wrapped hand for the Inquisitor to take. 'I can show you the way!'  
  
'And I had best depart on my own travels in the Fade,' Solas says, with a small farewell bow. 'But I will be close by if my aid is needed'.  
  
His expression becomes stern again, as he says in conclusion,  
  
'A word of warning, lethallin: be careful when visiting that man's thoughts. You may have given him... acceptance - but he could still be capable of treachery. Especially considering his heritage, and yours'.  
  
'Thank you, hahren! I don't think he'll betray me - but I am gonna be careful all the same. For his sake. Don't wanna upset him by snooping too much inside his head. I think I will just leave some sort of... message... To reassure him'  
  
The Inquisitor is still talking to Solas when the scene around her begins to darken. Gradually, the image of the older elf, still standing on a cliff on the outskirts of the pink-swathed village, fades away - and in its stead, comes absolute, pitch blackness. The young elf and the spirit boy find themselves suspended in a boundless, abyssal space, with nothing around them, above or below, except for the same unchanging inky colour. It is hard to tell whether they are walking or floating or falling - sinking endlessly into blinding, stifling emptiness, with not a sound or a gust of wind or a flicker of light to make even a tiniest shift in this expanse of black.  
  
The Inquisitor shudders.  
  
'Is this some sort of... in-between space to go from dream to dream?' she asks, starting at the sound of her own voice. 'Are we supposed to look for a gateway or something? At least it will be easy to spot...'  
  
Cole shakes his head, allowing the elf's hand to slip out of his grasp as she whirls on the spot and looks around.  
  
'We are already there,' he says simply. 'This is what he is dreaming of'.  
  
'A... A dark, empty place?' the Inquisitor's eyes well up with tears, underneath childishly arched eyebrows. 'Oh, the poor, poor soul...'  
  
'He likes it better this way,' Cole points out, glancing left and right the way the Inquisitor did just now, his expression very intent, as though he is trying to make out some barely audible sound.  
  
'Oblivion, at long last; it was such a good idea, to work, to write, to stare at the parchment for hours and hours without food and rest, until my mind wears through, to a state of blissful blankness... Is that what the Tranquil feel?'  
  
The Inquisitor weaves her fingers tightly together, her hands resting on her chest.  
  
'So that's why he's been avoiding me...' she mouths. 'Burying himself in his research, brushing me off when I came to cheer him up... Oh Gereon, Gereon, I am so sorry...'  
  
Cole, in the meanwhile, continues to recite was he has learned about the pain of this hauntingly blank mind's owner.  
  
'Too tired to think, nothing for the spirits to latch on to... This means no nightmares tonight - no visions of that pale, sweat-dabbed face among the pillows, blackened veins swelling under his skin like vile roots. My boy, my dear boy, light of my life - you told me I should let you go, continue pushing forward, see the Inquisition's mission through; but it is so hard, so very hard... I am failing you again'.  
  
Hearing the spirit boy's mournful chant, the Inquisitor cries out, tears now streaming down her face - and when she does, a tiny burst of green flame suddenly breaks through the skin of her palm. She looks at its swirling tongues in silent bewilderment, as though seeing the Fade's mark in her flesh for the first time - but only for a few seconds. Then, taking a decisive draught of air, she raises her arm above her head, her broad-bridged nose wrinkled in concentration, and, slowly and carefully, moves her hand back and forth, as though closing a Rift. All the while, the little flame in her palm grows brighter and brighter, emitting a single broad ray of light, which the elf traces across the wall of darkness before her, as if writing on black parchment with acid-green ink. Or rather, drawing: first, a lopsided circle; and when, two dots and a bold curve to form a comically smiling face.  
  
It stands out vividly against the inky background - a round, happy thing, its mouth (such as it is) drawn into a michievous smirk. Not the most dramatic (or the most serious) transformation of the Fade, but apparently, enough to do the trick: after a minute or so, the darkness around the glowing green drawing begins to wear thin, turning into a see-through greyish pall, which falls back, sooner or later, and reveals the more familiar hazy green clouds and oddly shaped rocks, like the ones Solas showed the Inquisitor during their studies of the Fade. And amid those rocks, still bending over reams of curling parchment sheets, in the hunched pose that he must have dozed off in, there sits a lonely, weary man, with deep shadows around his eyes and countless lines of hurt and helpless anger etched into his skin.  
  
Still, as weary and sorrowful as his countenance is, the Inquisitor smiles when she sees him, and looks around eagerly to point him out to Cole... Only to find nothing but more rocks all around her. The spirit boy is gone - perhaps off to visit the mind of someone else who needs his help. Whatever the case, the rest of the delicate, gentle helping process has apparently been left up to her.  
  
'Gereon!' the Inquisitor calls out to her forlorn friend, leaping from one twisted green boulder to another to reach his desk. 'Gereon! You are not lost in blackness any more!'  
  
He looks up at her dazedly, his bloodshot eyes lighting up for a moment.  
  
'Inquisitor...' he whispers. 'Yavanna... Now that is a dream I did not expect to see'.  
  
'You are not dreaming, lethallin,' she smiles, coming up so close that she could take his hand in hers if she brought herself to - but all she allows herself is a gentle brush against his skin with her fingertips.  
  
'Well, you are asleep, like I am... But I have actually found my way into your dream - the real me, not a spirit reflection or anything! Solas helped, and Cole... But it probably doesn't matter too much...'  
  
She bumbles off into silence, her cheeks suddenly feeling flushed with pulsing warmth, as she registers the astonishment in his gaze - and then suddenly realizes that the simple grey blouse and leggings that she fell asleep in have inexplicably transformed into a long, flowing gown, canary yellow and then softly blending into pink at the hem of its many-folded skirt and sleeves, the way the bright hues blend in the morning sky. It is actually... quite lovely, wherever it came from; she rather likes it. She has never worn a dress before, but has always wondered what it would be like if she got all prettied up like human women... Perhaps someone in the Fade sensed that... but ah, look at her, getting too self-absorbed as always. This is not what matters right now.  
  
'I am sorry I am barging in like this,' she continues, the fabric of her mystery garment seeming to emit some sort of inner glow as she smiles again. 'I will be out of your dream soon, I promise! I just wanted to tell you... I would like to come visit you some time, in the... real world. Like I did in your cell, remember? I... I could talk to you. About anything you want - anything at all; the silliest, most impossible stuff that might bring out the faintest ghost of a smile. Or - or I could just sit there and hold you like before. In a hug, I mean. Anything to help you... help you look past this horrible pain inside your heart. Help you rest'.  
  
'You are so insistent on comforting me,' he responds with a slight frown. 'And curiously enough, when we... talked over the sending crystal... Felix told me to listen to you. So... So I might just do it. If your advisors have no objections - please, visit me in the library or the Undercroft. I have been so... distraught... that, until now, it didn't occur to me how much I...'  
  
He finishes the sentence quietly, almost shyly.  
  
'...How much I appreciate our encounters'.  
  
'Thank you for letting me help you, Gereon,' the Inquisitor beams, inclining her head the way Solas did, before stepping away and closing her eyes, arduously focusing on any mental images that might take her to her own corner of the dream realm.  
  
In a moment, she will fade away, like an ethereal shadow, cloaked in rays of pure morning sunlight - and her unlikely friend will be left to gaze at the pale green shape, which is still visible among the Fade's ever-shifting clouds overhead. A simple, happy message that she left behind, suddenly reminding him of the day when his son was crippled by pain and he tried his best to comfort him.  
  
He has no way of knowing it, but he is destined to rely on this cheery shape once more, many months from now, when the Inquisitor collapses under the mountainous weight of her own sorrow, and he finally pays her back for all those... encounters when she made (and is yet to make) him forget that he is lost and defeated and broken. When the time comes, he will take up a little porcelain saucer and trace his finger along the wet imprint of the cup of tea he will brew for her, to at least somehow chase away the cold gripping at her heart. And, stroking her twitching shoulders with his free hand, he will turn the splatters of tinted liquid into a lopsided circle. Accompanied by two dots and a bold curve to form a comically smiling face.


End file.
